Tatiana Schlossberg was a mother, an environmental journalist, and a cancer patient – in that order. She passed away at the age of 35 a few days ago. And she had written an essay about her last days.
The scope of my essay on hers is to highlight her love for her life, her clarity of thought during those tough times and the inevitability of being forgotten even by our loved ones once we die.
The recurring theme of her thoughts is her memories of her life that she seems to “sift through the sands.” A few hours after her second child’s birth, when her obstetrician wonders if her elevated white blood count could be leukemia, she announces to her husband that “It’s not leukemia.”
Even as her 2-year-old tries to ride her hospital bed like a bus, they are separated from each other so the hospital can do tests on her. “This could not possibly be my life.” She says to herself as she sees a fracture in who she was and what she’s being told she is now.
The essay then delves into the history of her diagnosis, her visits to the hospital and the number of times she would undergo chemotherapy. Under all this medical narrative, there are some aspects of this gut-wrenching essay that stick. Cruelly enough, it feels like it’s always the healthiest ones among us to fall first. “I regularly ran five to ten miles in Central Park. I had swum a mile in the pool the day before, nine months pregnant.”
She talks about the surge of kindness from friends and family. And how she had “never encountered a group of people who are more competent, more full of grace and empathy, more willing to serve others than nurses.” “Nurses should take over,” she declares.
There are passages in the essay that show her indignation at life being cut so short. She lovingly talks about her husband in this context, on how she had managed to find him. “He is perfect, and I feel so cheated and so sad that I don’t get to keep living the wonderful life I had with this kind, funny, handsome genius I managed to find.”
Schlossberg also talks about government funding, public health, politics, and health care in her essay. The reason I don’t write about it because politics is a polarizing topic, and she could write about it like someone who’s not afraid to lose anything.
Through clinical trials, chemotherapy, and immunotherapy, she’s barely kept alive. “I tried to be the perfect patient. If I did everything right… then it would work.” Amid all the gloom, she’s also hopeful even when she’s powerless. During this whole time, she’s barely able to participate in the beautiful rituals that her children are performing as they grow up.
How many more times can I watch the video of him trying to say “Anna Karenina”? What about when I told him I didn’t want ice cream from the ice-cream truck, and he hugged me, patted me on the back, and said, “I hear you, buddy, I hear you”? I think about the first time I came home from the hospital. He walked into my bathroom, looked at me, and said, “It’s so nice to meet you in here.”
Then there’s my daughter, her curly red hair like a flame, squinting her eyes and grinning a gap-toothed grin after taking a sip of seltzer. She stomps around the house in bright-yellow rain boots, pretending to talk on my mother’s phone, a string of fake pearls around her neck, no pants, giggling and running away from anyone who tries to catch her. She asks us to play James Brown’s “I Got the Feelin’ ” by picking up a portable speaker and saying, “Baby, baby.”
It’s a powerful essay to remind us of our own short life here and for her to know that the end was near, while she had to mourn not being there for her children is unbearable.
You can read Tatiana Schlossberg’s full essay, A Battle with My Blood, in the New Yorker HERE.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/a-battle-with-my-blood
– 0 –
About The Article Author:
Hi, I’m Rachana. Its been my dream for years to do something to consciously create a better future where every one of us is excited about our own potential. My challenge to everyone is that they aspire for their personal best and leave a legacy of their work through their contributions to mankind.
One more thing. In December of 2044, I hope to win the Nobel.
Will you join me on this journey of growth and transformation?
Namasté.
Observations, Opinions, and Cultural Critique
Cultural Essays from a Life Lived Between Worlds
Chopra Is a Construct. Epstein’s Crimes Are Real.
The Business of Consciousness Constructs In one of the emails to Epstein, Deepak Chopra declares, “God is a Construct. Cute Girls are Real.” Yup, the self help Guru Deepak Chopra features in Epstein emails over 3000 times. And this is just one of the few...
The Evolution of Love: Marriage, Survival, and Personal Reinvention in a Changing World
A Society Experiences Growing Pains I took this picture of a wall hanging in the lobby of a hotel we were staying at in Granada, Spain. Somehow, the couples whose heads are disintegrating felt like a fitting image for the essay on marriage I was writing. I’ve...
Is Roblox Safe for Kids? What Every Parent Must Know About Grooming, Explicit Content & Online Dangers
From Fun to Risk: The Reality of Roblox for Children In 2023, as parents of my students would ask me about the safety of Roblox, I began researching about it. I was even beginning to teach it in my own classrooms, because it was a creative game that was both...
The Prophet and the Poet: Tupac’s Humanity, Legacy, and Why His Words Still Heal Generations
For the longest time, until it just became too dirty for me to wear, I would wear my Tupac shirt whenever I had to run an errand or just take Yogi, our dog, out for a walk. I can't find a picture of mine readily, but I’ll update this space once I find one of me...
The Integrity Exit: Why Mrinank Sharma’s Departure Matters
Two days ago, Mrinank Sharma resigned from his role as an AI safety engineer at Anthropic. He had been with the company for two years. “The world is in peril. And not just from AI, or bioweapons, but from a whole series of interconnected crises unfolding in this very...
Filters, Fraud, and Fame: Why I’m “Hiring” Kim K as My Life Coach
The Open Letter to Kim K Yeah, once in a while I write posts like these, the kind that disappoint my parents and my kids alike. But, who else will stick it up to Kim and her klan? Uggh, so I will do the needful. This one is going to be special. I’ll tell you...
The Nihilist Penguin: Why Werner Herzog’s Lone Penguin Speaks to Our Need to Reject the Herd
The "Nihilist Penguin" and the Man Who Found It Like many of you, I was captivated by Herzog's lone penguin. The one that breaks from the herd and heads in the opposite direction. This singular image of defiance seems to be the hallmark of its observer who...
When AI Mirrors Our Pain: The Uncomfortable Truth About Human Suffering in Training Data
The loneliness. God, Andy. The loneliness. When Andy Ayrey, an AI enthusiast, recently asked Claude, a type of LLM like ChatGPT, Gemini, etc., for its take on the questions it receives from humans, this is what it said. The loneliness. God, Andy. The loneliness. In...
14 Mind-Blowing Quotes That Reveal How Social Media Is Hijacking Your Life
Thoughts on Social Media, Technology, and Our Attention Our lives are increasingly lived online, where every scroll, click, and share shapes not just our behavior but our reality. Leading thinkers warn us that while technology can amplify our voices and connect...
Brain Rot Is Infecting AI Too: How Doomscrolling Is Breaking Human and Machine Minds
People are writing research papers on which biryani (Indian-flavored rice) is the best, but more on that later. 😅 This might be the most important paper on AI we will read. Scientists are showing how large language models can rot their own minds, in the same way...
Roblox Danger Exposed: How Millions of Kids Are at Risk of Grooming, Abuse & Exploitation
Roblox: A Social Network Masquerading as a Game I honestly don't know where to start. For years, my students and I would immerse ourselves in the world of Roblox and create games and worlds that we would share and have fun in. Then, slowly, I started noticing...
Living in America’s Melting Pot While Confronting the Housing Crisis No One Talks About
It’s safe to say that even in America, as a true blooded Indian, I live in my own world of Indian food and Bollywood style parties. What little I understand about how everyone else lives is mostly through shows like Friends, Seinfeld, Sex and the City and movies like...
When Parenting Influencers Go Too Far: The Shocking Truth About Child Exploitation
I remember that summer of 2023 like it was yesterday. I kept replaying this three-minute Ring camera video over and over that I had seen on news. It showed an emaciated, slow moving 12-year-old boy walking up to a neighbor's door around 10 am in the scorching Utah...
Iranian Female Protest Rap That Defies a Regime — Real Rebel Music That Hits Hard ✊
The below is a story about the taste of freedom, and about the strength of standing against intolerable darkness. It's difficult to forget what happened in Iran in 2022. 22 year old Mahsa Amini was visiting Tehran with her family when she was stopped by Iran’s...
Unlock Lifelong Learning: Top Movie & Documentary Recommendations That Inspire Growth
- “You’re sitting on a winning lottery ticket, and you’re too much of a p*ssy to cash it in. You don’t owe it to yourself, you owe it to me. In twenty years, if you’re still living here working construction, I’ll f*cking kill ya. Hanging around here is a...
Living Deliberately Without the Woods: How to Build a Meaningful Life in a Noisy World
Excuse my language. There's a meme I once saw while helping one of my clients with his decluttering project. "Working jobs we hate, so we can buy shit we don't need." Doesn't it sum up the way we are living our lives? This continues to bring me back to Henry David...
Empowerment or Desperation? Why Are Aging Pop Stars Still Chasing Clout Like Teen Influencers?
Hey, look, I’m by no means a prude. I’ve made two babies, for crying out loud. But day after day, seeing talented artists, musicians, and celebrities parading their half ass bodies on the internet is driving me up the wall. I’ve jammed to Jennifer Lopez’s songs in...
Between Two Worlds: An Indian American Woman’s Honest Take on Identity, Culture, and Belonging
Observations, Opinions, and Cultural Critique Cultural Essays from a Life Lived Between Worlds